Time Period: About 7 years after school. Harry is about 24 & flashbacks of his 7th year at Hogwarts.
Spoilers: Hopefully you've read all the books and book five. But it doesn't matter to much. If characters are dead... it's because it's implied that they died in the passing time period. ;D Did that make sense? I hope so. :x
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Hogwarts
7th Year (November 12th)
A week later Harry was officially free to go about life normally. Well, with as much normalcy you could get when people were constantly whispering and glaring and avoiding you.
He'd held himself back from attacking people too many times to count. But, coming as a surprise to Harry, Draco was not among those people who whispered and glared- instead Draco was avoiding him. He was the only one, in fact, that had avoided him.
Unless you count the people that normally pretended he didn't exist.
Typical behavior for Malfoy consisted of devious smirks and snide remarks. Instead of that... Harry received nothing from the boy. Not even a look. Maybe it was the warning Harry had given that kept him away. Somehow he doubted that was the reason. If a warning was all he needed to keep Malfoy away from him... he would have tried it long ago.
The rumors flying around him should have made him burn with hatred... but somehow he managed to stay numb. After all, it would be over soon. Wouldn't it?
The nighttime had quieted down for Harry after the incident. Instead of wandering the halls at night, as he had been doing, he decided to sit up late in the common room- tinkering with his notebook, as he had done most of the summer. Harry wasn't the type to write poems, but lately it was all he could do. He could barely manage anything else and, when he wrote a poem, there was usually a good reason. He stared down at his current poem, reading it again and again.
Can't be innocent, can't be free.
When you've pulled me down and held your hands to me
Your blue eyes glistened, made the oceans jealous
What is it you want of me
What made you so jealous
Didn't you notice you'd shattered my wings
That you deprived me of all pure things
No longer innocent, only a fake
No longer me, but a remake
No longer shining, but a dimming white light
Heaven no longer sings to me, but detests of my sight
He loved the poem because it was so raw... as if someone had been ripped apart, emotionally and physically, and in every way possible, by someone they'd loved. But hated it because it had nothing in common with him; nothing like his love life.
Besides the rumors of his suicide attempt, life was dull.
He had never been ruined by anyone, unless you count the deaths of his parents and his Godfather and every other reason to live. He hadn't been the target of jealousy, or so he thought in his ignorance. No one had ever laid any kind of hand on him, except to kill him . Though, on his most depressing days, all he could do was wish someone would.
Harry ripped the page from the notebook, bending the spiral on the book, and threw the page hastily into the fireplace. No poem could describe his feelings right now… maybe because there were no words to do so.
Looking back in the pages of poems, each one read like a story. You could read through them and know everything Harry had been thinking since the end of summer had come. Only these pages, and Harry himself, knew what was going on in his fucked up head.
But now, when he truly wanted to capture himself on those pages, he couldn't find the words to do so.
He'd just gotten to the poem he'd written at the beginning of the year when someone tapped him on the shoulder.
"Harry..."
He smiled lightly at her, "Hey Gin'." She smiled back, sitting down in the armchair kiddy corner him.
"Why are you up so late?" She yawned and he answered, "Just writing some things that have been on my mind. I couldn't sleep..."
"Neither could I." There was a pause as they looked into the fire but not at one another, "Harry..."
Ginny wasn't exactly sure what to say. Should she bring up what everyone else feared to bring up? Should she leave Harry alone with his notebook? She decided that if she didn't do it, no one would, "Why did you do it, Harry?"
He barely looked up from his writings, speaking low as his pen scratched the surface of the muggle notebook paper, "Sometimes you get to a point where it doesn't really matter, Ginny. Sometimes you just feel like your trapped and someone's using you as their own personal slave."
Staring at him, she frowned, and added onto his speech, "Sometimes you just have to be strong, even if it means overcoming the worse things in life." She tilted Harry's chin up and kissed his forehead gently, showing him support, "You know... the strength you have Harry, you could do something so great with that. Take me for example: I'm in my sixth year and Ron still thinks I'm his 5 year old sister who needs to be cradled when she gets a scrap on her knee. But you, Harry, hold the respect of so many people. Do you understand how immense that is?"
"I don't need their respect. I don't want it. Sometimes having so much attention on you and thousands of people holding onto you as their last hope... it's not as great as you would think." Harry didn't mean to be come off so pessimistic, but he couldn't help it.
Ginny nodded and walked back towards the stairs to her dorm. "You'll see what I mean... Someday Harry, trust me."
'No, you'll be the one that's going to see.' Harry thought in the back of his mind, staring at the fireplace. He didn't care what anyone had to say about him anymore. Ginny had only tried to help him, he should have been grateful for it, but somehow he didn't care. Why wasn't he grateful? Then again, Harry couldn't think of anything as of late that he was grateful for.
The fire blazed long after Harry passed out on the couch, drifting into another tormented sleep.
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Hogwarts
7th Year (November 13th)
It was Harry's third day back to classes and today was Advanced Potions, with the rest of his day free.
One thing he'd been happy for was that 7th year gave you at least one almost free day during the week. So, every Wednesday, Harry had only one class. Though it was with Snape, with mostly Slytherins, Harry didn't care. He could fake his way most of the hour and, finally, relax for the rest of the day until quidditch practice.
If there was one thing Harry still cared about... it was flying. Quidditch was just about the only thing Harry could still manage to put his heart and soul into. He was ferocious in games, sometimes to the point of getting himself pulled from the field. Even now, sitting here in Snapes class and listening to the lecture, all he could think about was flying.
"Potter? Could you pay a little more attention perhaps?" He was tempted to reply with 'no', but instead he just nodded his head tiredly. "Five points from Gryffindor." Harry went back to scribbling in his notebook, knowing he didn't give a shit about 'points'.
Not far from Harry was a pair of eyes glued to the back of his head.
As far as Draco could tell, Harry didn't have a clue that he was even in the room. Either that or Harry didn't care that he was. His eyes scanned over Harry, catching the bandage across his right wrist that he knew he was trying to hide. Even he wondered why he didn't expose Harry to his peers.
What was keeping him from doing so was a total mystery.
Maybe the fact was he really did feel horrible for Harry Potter. Was that even a possibility?
Before either of the boys knew it, class had ended and people had already moved out to the halls.
Not only was Wednesday free class for Harry, but Draco as well. Though it was an oblivious fact to both of them...
Hermione and Ron both had a class that day. So, almost every Wednesday, Harry found himself alone on the quidditch pitch, flying through the air no matter what the weather, even though he knew quidditch practice would start in two hours anyways.
It just happened to be this day that Draco decided he should get in some practice too.
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